


Five Times Esca Hit Marcus in the Face

by Sineala



Category: The Eagle (2011)
Genre: 5 Things, Community: kink_bingo, Consensual Violence, M/M, Non-Canonical Violence, Roleplay, Violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-08-02
Updated: 2011-08-02
Packaged: 2017-10-22 03:06:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,270
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/233069
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sineala/pseuds/Sineala
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Even if you'd choose to do the same thing again, it makes all the difference in the world to be able to have the choice.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Five Times Esca Hit Marcus in the Face

**Author's Note:**

> Please be advised that one scene includes consensual violence in a kink context.
> 
> I have never written a Five Things story before, therefore I think I am owed at least one. This (okay, a fifth of it, and by my reckoning the heart of the story) is for Kink Bingo, "roleplaying." Thanks to Carmarthen and Lishan for beta and encouragement!

**Unus**

Marcus ought to have known buying a fighter was a bad idea. And even though he did not himself buy Esca, the purchase was his fault, and the man is therefore his responsibility. But Esca is badly suited to house-slavery, like a poor man in an ill-fitting tunic, and even while he lifts endless cups of broth to Marcus' lips he glowers. As though he wishes to do anything else. As though he wishes to be free.

It touches Marcus, and he wishes it didn't. He wishes he felt nothing for this man, for he does not understand what he feels, nor why. He even wishes, some of the time, that he'd just let Esca die as he had wanted, for perhaps that would be better than this.

When Marcus is healed enough he invites Esca to spar with him, thinking both that he could use the practice and that Esca, having been a gladiator, would enjoy the fight.

When Esca refuses, he orders him to.

"Now," Marcus says, holding up his fists, nearly blocking out the glare of Esca's narrowed eyes with his hands, "don't hold back--"

He doesn't even see the punch, but between one breath and the next he is on his back, and blood is dripping from his nose.

From somewhere above him, Esca drops his hands. "Will that be all?"

Marcus struggles to his feet, outraged, in pain, and embarrassed to be taken so quickly. It was not even a fair fight.

"Apologize for your dishonorable ways," he grits out. "That is not how civilized men fight."

Esca stares at him, and his eyes are fire. "I apologize, _domine_ ," he says, in the same tone in which one might say _I curse you and all your descendants_.

Then he turns and walks inside.

Marcus stands there until his wounded leg can no longer hold him, and he wonders what he did wrong.

**Duo**

He has been a fool. He thought Esca liked him. He thought the smiles, the companionship on hunts, the fact that Esca came north with him, fought rogue warriors beside him-- he thought it all meant something.

He sees now that he was wrong. Esca lied. Esca lied about the Eagle, about everything, and can he not see he should be grateful, he should be begging Marcus' forgiveness? It is through Marcus' mercy that he still lives, and it is as if he has forgotten who the master is--

"It is the place of heroes," Esca calls to him, still riding along as if nothing is unusual, as if he is in the right here. Esca would lie about having known of the place? Esca would celebrate the death of his father? Esca would be proud?

"How dare you," Marcus says, and Esca draws his horse to a stop. "You're still my slave!"

Esca is pale, but holds himself high, defiant. "You'd be dead in a ditch if it weren't for me!"

Has he forgotten the arena so soon? "I saved your miserable life!" Marcus roars back.

Then Esca is slamming into him, and he is tumbling backwards off his horse and down the slope, Esca's hands making fists in his tunic as they fall together. He has but the barest instant to hope he will not crack his head open on the ground or under the hooves, and then together they hit the dirt. Esca is shoving at him, punching him over and over, holding him down, and Marcus wonders how he could ever have thought this man his friend.

And then--

**Tres**

Esca's grip slackens, and Marcus looks around. They are surrounded by barbarians, spear-carrying, clad in furs. After a long pause, one of them calls out something in British, and Esca says something back. He doesn't know what Esca's saying, but Esca stands tall, almost regal, and tells the barbarians something.

Then he hits Marcus again.

At this point he can hardly feel it, through the rest of the pain. He can hardly feel anything, really, he decides.

After they tie him behind the horse, he is willing to reconsider that last statement. He wonders if he will be able to walk after this. If he survives it. And still Esca tells him nothing.

When they finally arrive, he is stared at, poked at, prodded.

Esca looks at him like he doesn't even know him.

"You're my slave," he says.

He ought to have expected that.

**Quattuor**

He only thinks to smile at the girls. He doesn't want them, not really; his needs have narrowed to keeping himself alive. But they are the first people in days who have looked at him like he might be human.

And then he is sprawling on the rocks, the Seal Prince standing over him. Esca is not far behind. What has he done? Surely they will not kill him for a smile?

The Seal Prince snarls something and Esca replies, almost as if he is trying to calm him down, but he can't be. The prince only says something just as angry, and if Marcus is going to die for this he wants to know what it is.

Then Esca turns to him, saying something in British, and his face is wild, terrifying, and Marcus begins to contemplate that Esca could truly kill him. He is not safe. Nothing is safe.

"Kneel!" Esca says, and, oh, he will not. He cannot. He is a Roman. He will not bow to this.

Then Esca hits him, and it is worse than the prince because it is Esca, a man whom he thought he liked, who he thought could like him, and everything between them is gone. Marcus' head snaps back with the force of the blow and he staggers and nearly falls.

"Get on your knees!" Esca repeats. "Do it!"

And then Esca is there, shoving him down by the shoulders, pulling his neck back, twisted and hideously exposed, waiting for a blade.

 _I will kill you_ , he thinks, over and over, as Esca is no doubt offering him up like a sacrifice for some British god. _I will kill you_.

But when he says it, Esca's face does not change, as if the words mean nothing, as if he does not know Latin. So be it. This is not the man whose life Marcus saved that day in Calleva. He is a barbarian warrior, and his blood should be drained like the rest of them.

**Quinque**

It takes him a long time to talk about it. It is a year since they have returned from Caledonia, six months since they bought horses and founded the farm, and another three since that autumn day when Esca kissed him out beyond the fences and everything changed again.

Esca is always kind with him, always gentle when they are together. Oh, during the day he can be sharp-tongued, biting, complaining, but when they douse the lamp at night and bed down in the pallet his hands glide over Marcus with love as though he had never pushed him down, never hit him, never hurt him. And the cares loom up in Marcus as the days pass, and the weight of what they used to be to each other grows heavier the closer they draw. He wants to know who Esca is now. He wants to know what Esca, this Esca, would do to him.

"Do you ever think about Caledonia?"

He means the question to sound idle, and perhaps in a way it is. For it is a cold winter's day, with rain lashing down. The horses have been taken care of and there is little else to do, not and risk a chill. So he is here, with Esca, under the blankets, enjoying just a little bit of laziness.

Esca lifts his head. "Why, of course," he says, as if it the simplest thing, but Marcus knows they don't both mean the same subject. "What about it?"

"You don't--" he clears his throat and looks away-- "you don't miss it, do you?"

"Miss it?" Esca looks at him, blankly, Esca who is usually so clever, and Marcus realizes he will have to explain this.

"Do you miss being my master?" he clarifies, forcing the words out, and he watches, crestfallen, as Esca's face twists in a kind of disgust.

He isn't sure whether he should be happy. Of course he did not want Esca to really like it, but at the same time, he wishes-- he wishes--

Esca's words are all confused amazement. "How can you think I would miss that?" he asks. "Do you miss it? If you miss it, here, go outside and tie yourself to Equulus and I'll have him drag you around the paddock for an hour! Why in the world would I miss that? Then, oh, you can stand in the rain for another hour while your leg bleeds, and maybe I'll toss you a raw rat if you're hungry," he continues, clearly imagining nothing positive, and Marcus is beginning to wish he had never said anything, and he can't look at Esca, he can't-- "Finally," Esca finishes, "come back in and I'll shove you to your knees and hit you in the face--"

 _Yes_ , Marcus thinks, and something inside him he didn't even know existed sings bright, bright at the thought of Esca being his master again, only it would be different, better--

"Oh." Esca stops dead, and is staring. "Marcus, is that what you want? You want to pretend we are as we were then? You want me to hit you?"

He still can't look at him. "It would-- it would help," he mumbles, his face hot. "It would be better. I would know it was you, and you hadn't betrayed me, and you would stop if I asked."

The words don't make any sense, the way they come out of his mouth, and he isn't sure Esca understands him. It is about trust, in a way. It is not that he does not trust Esca, for he does, but it is like doing the affair over from the beginning, pretending to be themselves again, the selves they were before. What it would be like if he chose to kneel, if he had the choice. He wants to know this. He thinks he would like it.

Esca is silent for a long while, and just as Marcus' mind, running in small terrified circles, has concluded he never should have said anything, Esca speaks. "If you are certain it is what you want, I will do this." The words come slowly, as if he doubts-- himself? Marcus' desires?

"It is," Marcus says. "I trust you."

"And you want me to do as I did before? To call you slave, to hit you?"

Marcus nods and does not dare speak.

"I have hit you a great number of times before." Esca's mouth quirks. "You never asked for this then."

"It is different," Marcus says, even though, oh, he is afraid too, but it is only Esca. "If I am asking for it, I could ask you to stop." He could never say that before, and he knows that is what matters. This Esca, the one he loves, would listen to him, is listening to him.

"All right." Esca's hand traces a warm line across Marcus' jaw, still gentle. "I will do this. But I will stop if you tell me."

"I know, _domine_ ," Marcus said, the word that he never called Esca north of the Wall, and somehow saying it makes him feel better. More equal, since Esca called him it, since Esca had to. He says it again, to see how it feels in his mouth.

Esca shivers against him, then abruptly pulls the blankets away and says something in British. The words are rough, alien, and for an instant it is too like that time with the Seal People and he thinks to call it off, but then Esca smiles and he knows it is not Esca betraying him as he had thought then, but only doing this as he had asked.

"I-- I think I might like that," Esca says, sounding uncertain, but still smiling.

" _Domine_ , I will call you what you like," Marcus says, trying it again. "Is it permitted to ask what you said in your language?"

"Orders." Esca is trying to keep his face firm, grim, but he is still smiling a little and Marcus is glad to see it. It is nothing like his face on that cold day, pale and harsh with tension. "I bade you kneel, O slave. _Caxte_. That is what we call a slave by, in my language. Or shall I force you to kneel?"

He wants Esca to make him, but perhaps one new thing at a time is enough. So Marcus crawls out of bed and kneels as Esca stands up. He is cold, but he has asked for this, and he has to know if it will be different--

"You were not fast enough." Esca is trying to invent an excuse; even he can see that much. "You are a lazy slave. Too proud, too proud by far."

Esca's voice is querulous, as a master's might be. Though his features are set now, a master punishing a slave, his eyes are wide and wondering. One last chance.

 _Please_. Marcus' mouth shapes the words, so Esca can see. _Hit me._

The blow comes fast and hard, and Esca's hand leaves fire behind it, burning across his cheek like the sun, full of life, and this time it is right, it is right, he is healed.

**Author's Note:**

> The horse's name is Horsie. I was really stuck for names, okay? Also Esca is addressing Marcus, at the end, in reconstructed Gallo-Brittonic. If I understand the grammar correctly, that ought to be the vocative for "slave."


End file.
